D. Trump is guilty of sexual assault: to pay $5 million

D. Trump found guilty of sexual assault and defamation

US President Donald Trump lost his appeal in a case in which he was found guilty of sexually assaulting and defaming the author Jean Carroll. The woman will receive compensation of USD 5 million, according to a decision by the Federal Court of Appeal.

According to the original case, the incident took place in 1996 in the dressing room of a Bergdorf Goodman department store in Manhattan, where the now 81-year-old woman claims Trump raped her. Another lawsuit is based on an October 2022 post on the Truth Social network in which Trump denied Carroll's accusation, calling it a hoax. The former Elle magazine journalist was awarded 2.02 million dollars for sexual assault and 2.98 million dollars for defamation. 

The current US President disagrees with the decision. He believes that errors were made during the trial, including the erroneous admission into evidence of an Access Hollywood recording of him talking about grabbing women^[1]. However, the court retorted that this "reaffirms the sexual abuse against Carroll". The Court of Appeals eventually rejected Trump's request for a retrial.

In addition to this case, Trump faces other legal challenges, including an award of USD 83.3 million in damages to Carroll in another defamation case related to his 2019 statements. Carroll's lawyers argued that the amount awarded was one way to stop Mr Trump from further defaming the plaintiff. In both denials, Trump said he did not know Carroll. The latter claimed that she made up the rape story to promote her memoirs.

At the trial last year, Carroll said she met Trump in a shop where he asked her to help him choose a gift for a friend. Carroll testified that he dragged her into a dressing room, closed the door and raped her. After the Court of Appeal's decision, Carroll was grateful to the court for delivering justice. 

"Both Jean Carroll and I are satisfied with the decision," said Carroll's lawyer Roberta Kaplan. According to the laity, the decision underlines the importance of the legal system in dealing with sexual violence and defamation cases, regardless of the status or position of the accused.

D. Trump's team says the allegations are untrue

D. Trump's message last week on a social networking site read as follows: 

"Should a woman go to jail for falsely accusing her husband of rape?". He urged people to share the post.

D. Trump is also spinning his wheels in other legal actions. Earlier this month, the US President indicted a juror who testified to 34 of Mr Trump's criminal acts. The President has also sued the Des Moines Register for publishing a poll in which he trailed Vice President Kamala Harris.

Steven Cheung, chief spokesman for the Trump campaign, said:

"The American people re-elected President Donald Trump. The American people have elected President Trump and are demanding an immediate end to political persecution and a swift halt to the witch hunt, including the Democrat-funded Caroll." It is known that Cheung was appointed White House Communications Director by Trump last month.

D. Trump's lawyers also argued to the federal appeals panel that the lower court in Manhattan erred in allowing two women to testify in the Carroll case. They claimed that he had sexually assaulted them^[2].

"D. Trump has not shown that the district court erred in its ruling," said the US Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit. The verdict was handed down by a three-judge panel composed of Denny Chin and Susan Carney, appointed by President Barack Obama, and Myrna Pérez, appointed by President Joe Biden. Trump was represented on appeal by D. John Sauer, his choice for US Solicitor General.

Presidents can be subject to civil lawsuits, US Supreme Court rules

Trump, denying his guilt, posted on a social networking site that Carroll's lawyer was a political agent. The Court also rejected Trump's claim that Reid Hoffman, a prominent Democratic critic, billionaire and co-founder of LinkedIn, had financed Carroll's case. It is interesting that the jury, made up of six men and three women, found that Mr Trump had sexually abused Carroll, but did not find that he had raped her. It was not clear why the jury chose the less serious offense of harassment over rape, which is defined as non-consensual sexual intercourse under state law and, therefore, more severely punished.

One of the jurors, Jessica Leeds, a businesswoman, said that Trump hugged her on a plane decades ago. Another, former People magazine writer Natasha Stoynoff, said that Trump forcibly kissed her at his Mar-a-Lago estate in 2005^[3].

The case is expected to continue even after Trump officially takes office as US President on 20 January 2025. The US Supreme Court unanimously ruled in 1997 that presidents in office are not immune from civil lawsuits for acts committed before they took office.